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System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

blog.system76.com

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Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#11

Post by rocky1138 »

nwah1 wrote: post #2

I admire the efforts to get coreboot support, and love their open hardware initiatives, but I don't understand why everyone has NIH syndrome. There was no need for them to create their own distro. That is a huge expense just to reinvent a wheel that has already been reinvented ten thousand times. And in the end most of their users will probably just load up the one they use already.

It's marketing speak. They hardly have their own distribution on a technical level. System76 can use this to prevent any non-developer UI mistakes like material design getting into the mix from upstream.

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#12

Post by AdmiralAsshat »

nwah1 wrote: post #2

I admire the efforts to get coreboot support, and love their open hardware initiatives, but I don't understand why everyone has NIH syndrome. There was no need for them to create their own distro. That is a huge expense just to reinvent a wheel that has already been reinvented ten thousand times. And in the end most of their users will probably just load up the one they use already.

I don't think it's unusual that a hardware vendor would want to provide an OS that is absolutely guaranteed to work on the hardware they're selling--that's just protecting your customers. Ideally it shouldn't even be necessary if all of your components have well-supported drivers, but this is Linux we're talking about--only three years ago I had to replace the default wireless card in my Dell XPS 13 because the broadcom one was flaky as hell in Linux.

As good FOSS citizens, they would be encouraged to try to upstream all of their tweaks to GNOME or Ubuntu instead, but that's no guarantee that the changes would actually be accepted. Isn't that how Unity started in the first place?

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#13

Post by behringer »

nwah1 wrote: post #2

I admire the efforts to get coreboot support, and love their open hardware initiatives, but I don't understand why everyone has NIH syndrome. There was no need for them to create their own distro. That is a huge expense just to reinvent a wheel that has already been reinvented ten thousand times. And in the end most of their users will probably just load up the one they use already.

Welcome to linux

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#14

Post by [deleted] »

ajnin wrote: post #9
nwah1 wrote: post #2

I admire the efforts to get coreboot support, and love their open hardware initiatives, but I don't understand why everyone has NIH syndrome. There was no need for them to create their own distro. That is a huge expense just to reinvent a wheel that has already been reinvented ten thousand times. And in the end most of their users will probably just load up the one they use already.

I was thinking the same thing. I wish they focused their efforts on making good hardware. The risk is that some features like power management will only work well with their OS and not other distros.

[deleted]

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#15

Post by bravo22 »

benchaney wrote: post #5
shmerl wrote: post #4

What's the story with AMD and coreboot? Why can't AMD support it? Their whole AGESA is a glaring blob.

Neither intel nor AMD supports core boot. Community efforts to add core boot focus entirely on intel because of market share (although intel is also plenty hostile to floss in this regard).

Not sure about the support. Intel employees regularly submit to coreboot repo. I know at least for the Atom based designs that I've been involved in Intel provides reference designs using coreboot and supports it.

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#17

Post by effie »

nwah1 wrote: post #2

I admire the efforts to get coreboot support, and love their open hardware initiatives, but I don't understand why everyone has NIH syndrome. There was no need for them to create their own distro. That is a huge expense just to reinvent a wheel that has already been reinvented ten thousand times. And in the end most of their users will probably just load up the one they use already.

It is to make the best product they can and avoid pitfalls of supporting millions of existing distros. If you had put in a lot of effort in making the hardware, would you just say to your buyer: "just download and install any linux os" and deal with the endless user problems that will, as a rule, appear? No, you provide the best system you can so everything works as smoothly as possible so the users are happy and do not call support or (god forbid) return the goods.

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#18

Post by wahern »

bravo22 wrote: post #15
benchaney wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither intel nor AMD supports core boot. Community efforts to add core boot focus entirely on intel because of market share (although intel is also plenty hostile to floss in this regard).

Not sure about the support. Intel employees regularly submit to coreboot repo. I know at least for the Atom based designs that I've been involved in Intel provides reference designs using coreboot and supports it.

AMD is a sponsor of coreboot according to https://www.coreboot.org/Sponsors

Personally, I think the fundamental issue relates to IP. If the hardware design is made transparent by amazing and freely available documentation you invite infringement claims, particularly from IP trolls. (Threats from competitors are probably more existential, though, at least for large companies.) Often time companies will say that their products contain third-party IP that they cannot disclose, but that's just a roundabout way of saying neither the company nor its suppliers want the hassle.

There are other reasons, too. For example, if you can't consistently provide such documentation it can make you look worse than if you had never bothered as it makes you appear unreliable. But I think the IP issue is what makes it a simple decision, notwithstanding whether the threats are actually substantial.

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